Need You Now
by Imaginari-Mari
Summary: Based on the Lady Antebellum song "Need You Now." She is in her room wondering when her life stopped being a fairy tale. He is drinking alone in a Toronto hotel, having burned all of his bridges before his stint in rehab. They both need someone. CrAsh
1. I'm All Alone

**Need You Now**

**Summary**: Based on the Lady Antebellum song "Need You Now." She is in her room wondering when her life stopped being the fairy tale she thought it was. He is drinking alone in a Toronto hotel, having burned all of his bridges before his stint in rehab. They both want answers, they both need someone to understand - and the person they each want to talk to most is just a phone call away. CrAsh.

1 A.M. My alarm clock's numerals flashed briefly as they switched, glowing bright red through the dim light in my room.

It was only an hour after midnight, and I was still in a terrible funk. My bed was so strewn with tissues that I, and my journal, had migrated to the floor. The only light in the room, aside from the alarm clock, was a candle in a glass jar on my bedside table. The light flickered, too small to have my mother charging in, lambasting me to turn off the light, but big enough to allow me to see the contents of the box I had in front of me.

A shoe box that once contained my favorite pair of boots was filled with photographs and knick-knacks, each containing a memory. I had begun to strew the contents of the both around me as I sat cross-legged on the floor, and had already gone through the photographs and memories from the most recent years of my life. Doing so had brought me lower than I had felt in a long, long time.

Earlier that week, Jimmy Brooks, the boy I had dated three times during my adolescence, had dumped me. He was tired of leaning on me, tired of using me as a crutch, and had met a girl at physio who was teaching him to be more independent. My fairy tale romance had imploded, and I was left wondering just who the hell I was.

I had been accepted into NYU, and Jimmy and I had planned on attending together as pre-law students. I was going to major in English, Jimmy in Political Science, and then we were going to apply to law schools together, eventually opening a firm together and riding off into the sunset in matching white Mercedes.

That dream seemed more and more ridiculous by the minute. Was it more Jimmy's dream than mine? Definitely. Had I gone along with it because I had convinced myself that it was the only way for me to keep him, especially after I had thwarted his dreams of rap stardom by deleting his track off of _my_ song? Yes.

I felt a few more tears escape and I brushed them away slowly, my hand heavy. They were no longer for Jimmy; the pain of that breakup had only hurt for a few hours. I didn't love him as much as I had tried to convince myself I did. No, those tears were the realization I had come to over the past few hours, as I scattered pictures and patches and dried corsages over my room. The good memories were all in the past, and I was alone.

I hadn't talked to Ellie in a few weeks. She had her own shit to deal with. Paige and I hadn't been close since sophomore year. Marco and I were never really friends. Spinner was still an ass, and I still harbored a lot of resentment for Manny. Emma had gotten the same glossy overcoat that I did, leaving her activism behind in favor of curls and lip gloss. I saw myself echoed in her, forgetting and ignoring the things I once cared so fervently about, and so I couldn't hang out with her. I felt so ashamed, looking into that mirror.

I pulled another set of photographs out of the box. They were held together with a rubber band and covered with a sheet of white paper, as if the past-me wanted to hide their contents from view. When I removed the paper, I suddenly wished I hadn't.

Craig and I on the couch in Joey's garage, smiling as we fake wrestled. My black hair, still in its goth phase, was messier than his was, and he was attempting to smooth it. The expression on his face was tender and the one on mine was delighted. This picture was taken a few days before the Luau dance our freshman year at Degrassi, before his father had died and before we revealed to each other our feelings. It was so innocent, our happiness so pure and easy and unaffected.

A copy of the note Craig had taped to my locker sophomore year. It was so simple: "Meet me in the gym. - C." But it had led to the first time he had ever said he loved me, his words wrapped in a song. The lyrics to that song, which I had written down later that night, were paper-clipped to the note. It was so beautiful, so simple and melodic- but tainted with the memory of his tryst with Manny.

A few more tears escaped.

A picture from the car wash Downtown Sasquatch played at our junior year. Craig, playing his guitar, was looking at the person behind him, his face a picture of awe. The person behind him was me, sitting at my keyboard as I improvised a bridge to our song because Spinner had completely lost the beat and Marco was blinded by the sun. He looked astonished and happy, the look in his eyes blossoming from friendly to tender.

I began to sob quietly as I realized that this photograph documented the moment that Craig fell back in love with me after the debacle of our sophomore year. It was a painful reminder of how much he had cared for me after we had gotten back together, and how I had thrown it way to go to England.

I would never forgive myself for doing that. Ever since I had left to go to London, Craig had frequently intruded on my thoughts. I would remember his smell and his cologne as I passed TopShop on Oxford Street, his laugh when I hung out with Ali and his friends in the pub, his eyes when I was looking into Jimmy's. He would always cross my mind at the times when I was with other men. His memory was always the standard I compared Ali and Jimmy to.

They never measured up. And in the end, I was left without the man I had loved more than anything else in my life, whom I had given up for a subpar flings. I was really, really alone.

My Blackberry blinked as a new email was delivered into my inbox, and I reached for my phone. I was suddenly hit with an overwhelming temptation, one that I had been fighting ever since I Jimmy and I had broken up and I found myself single and free for the first time since I got back to Toronto.

My fingers itched. Craig was still on speed dial in my phone, even after I had my contacts transferred to the Blackberry. All I had to do was press the 'C' on the full keyboard, and it would connect to his number (if it was still the same), and I would hear his voice and everything would be okay. I'd be able to figure myself and my life out.

That was the fantasy, anyway. But the rational side of me had fought the temptation to contact him, reminding me continually that I had no right to expect another fairy tale ending to the mess I had made of my heart. I didn't deserve his love, not anymore.

I glanced at my alarm clock again. 1:15 AM.

My heart ached, my eyes swam, the tears fell. I pressed 'C.'

I had lost all control, and I needed him now.


	2. I'm A Little Drunk

**Need You Now**

**Summary:** Based on the Lady Antebellum song "Need You Now." She is in her room wondering when her life stopped being the fairy tale she thought it was. He is drinking alone in a Toronto hotel, having burned all of his bridges before his stint in rehab. They both want answers, they both need someone to understand - and the person they each want to talk to most is just a phone call away. CrAsh.

1 A.M. The TV announcer reminded the audience that the newest Girls Gone Wild video would be premiering in 3 hours, during a commercial break for a late night crappy movie.

Craig tossed his third shot back, wincing as the the alcohol burned his throat and left a nasty taste on his tongue. The mostly full bottle of Jack Daniels lay on the hotel room's table, with Craig perched on the chair. He was on the tenth story, and he gazed out the window at the twinkling city he once called home.

He had bought the bottle earlier that evening, expecting a small get together with friends before he played in the music festival tomorrow. It was a Friday night, sure, and he was in town sort of last minute, but they'd at least pop by to see him, he'd thought.

But when he got back to the room, bottle in hand, and he picked up his phone to start dialing numbers, he had paused at each name. Ellie still hated him; she wouldn't come in a million years, especially because there was alcohol involved. Next. Marco would probably feel the same way as Ellie, and go along with whatever she decided. Next. He had never been close to Paige, Spinner was still an ass, and he was mad qqat Jimmy, because was now dating Ashley. He couldn't call anyone- there was no one to hang with in Toronto anymore.

_Ashley_.

He shook his head and poured another shot. Her name and her voice, her face and her voice had been intruding into his thoughts ever since he had seen her at Ellie's graduation. She had been so beautiful, her eyes so full of life, and it had been hard to realize that she wasn't there for him. She was there for Ellie. She really had forgotten him.

He threw himself into his music, ignored his girlfriend Manny, and became addicted to cocaine instead of dealing with his thoughts about and his feelings for her.

They never really went away.

She'd be absent from his thoughts for a week, two weeks tops, but then he'd have a month where he thought about her all the time. He thought of her more than anyone else in rehab, as therapy had helped him realize that everything he did, he did to get a reaction out of her. He wanted her to be shocked and guilty when she heard he was addicted to cocaine. He wanted her to be happy and envious when he played with Taking Back Sunday. He wanted her to cry and grimace and scream when he got back together with Manny. Everything always came back down to Ashley.

He stood up, shot still in hand, without a destination or a purpose, and swayed a bit on his feet. He had gotten drunk much more quickly than usual; the combination of not having dinner yet and the loneliness had drastically lowered his tolerance. He sat down heavily on his bed, his eyes staring, if unfocused, at they door.

In his fantasy, she would open the door, sweeping in and overtaking the gloom of the room with her confidence. Her shining brown hair would fall gently over her shoulders and her eyes would light up as she saw him, her one true love, still waiting for her like he always had him. She'd apologize profusely, grovel at his feet, and he'd pretend to be indifferent before scooping her up in his arms and-

His iPhone vibrated with an incoming text, making a horrendous noise as it bounced quickly on the nightstand. He grabbed and check the message, noting that his manager wanted him at the festival to start warming up at 1:30; his set started at 3.

He sighed, went to put the phone back on the nightstand, then hesitated. It would be so easy to call her. He knew she was still in Toronto, still at Degrassi, still with Jimmy- but it would make him feel so much better to hear her voice. Even if she told him that she was engaged to Jimmy, pregnant with his twins and ready to be the best housewife in Toronto, he still wanted to hear her voice. He had been controlling that particular urge since he arrived in Toronto that morning.

_I need her now_.

He glanced at the clock at the bottom of the TV screen. 1:15 AM. He tossed the whiskey back and went to punch in the number he still knew by heart, when his phone vibrated.

His courage failed him.

"Goddammit," he cursed, just before he answered without even glancing at the I.D. "Hello?"

"Craig?" The voice at the other end of the line faltered, as if taken aback and nearly frightened off by his gruff tone.

Craig's mouth fell open and his hand began to tremble. In his shock, tears filled his eyes.

"Ashley?" he breathed, his voice suddenly soft and gentle and disbelieving. "Is that really you?"

"Yes." Her voice was just as breathy, just was desperate. "I wanted to talk to you."

"Oh! I've been wanting to talk to you, too. I was just about to call you, in fact, when-" He cut himself off. He was rambling.

"You were?" A glimmer of hope resonated in her voice.

"Yes."

"Oh, Craig- I... Look, I know it's a quarter after one, and we haven't seen each other or had a conversation in ages, but I- I needed you- I mean, I needed to talk to you. Do you have time?

He smiled. "Yea." _I will always have time for you._

She took a deep breath before continuing. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry for abandoning you, treating you like shit. I'm sorry I never called, never wrote, and then hooked up with Jimmy as soon as I got back to Canada. I'm sorry I acted like a clod. I never should have gone, never should have stayed, and never should have left you. I threw away something amazing, and good, and right to be with guys who could never, ever measure up to you, and I don't deserve your lo- I mean, for you to forgive me. I will always lo- I mean, care about you, and I couldn't go on being silent about this anymore."

His voice trembled, his throat thick with tears when he replied. "Thank you, Ash. I needed to hear you say that- that you were sorry, that it was a mistake. I missed you so much that summer, and the year and a half afterward was a real mental mess for me. I thought I would hate you, that I would stay mad forever. But I will always care about you too, Ashley. I always have, more than you know."

"Oh, I do know, Craig. I really do. Nobody has ever taken your place in my heart. I think even Jimmy knew that, deep down. That probably made it easier for him to break up with me last week, actually."

Craig spit out the water he had been sipping. "You and Jimmy broke up? Finally?"

"Yes, finally. This go around lasted way too long, long after I stopped trying to convince myself that I loved him. I never did."

"What made you decide to call me, then? I'm not some weird rebound, am I?"

"Never, Craig. Never. My heart just managed to take control from my head. I was feeling so alone tonight, with no one to turn to- and the only person whom I couldn't stop thinking of was you."

HIs heart skipped a beat as he realized she had been feeling the same way he had that night, their emotions and thoughts in sync.

"You needed me." It wasn't a question.

"Yes, I needed you." There was no shame, no embarrassment in her voice. "I needed to clear things up between us, I needed to know that you didn't hate me, I needed you to know that I still cared. But, most of all I needed you."

He paused. "Well, I needed you too. I've been feeling the same way- alone, depressed, without anyone to talk to. You've been crossing my mind more and more lately, and I still need you. I don't want to just talk to you- I want to see you."

His honesty made her hesitate for only a second. It appeared that she felt the same way he did: why continue to beat around the bush, to be coy and cautious? They needed to just take what they wanted.

"I want to see you too; I'd go as far to say that I need to. But you're in Vancouver."

"No," he said, delighted. "I'm in Toronto, playing at the Vans festival tomorrow. I'm staying in the Mariott downtown. Room 1012."

"I'll be there in 20 minutes."

He flushed. "I'm, uh.. a little drunk. Shots of whiskey will do that to you."

"So this is all because of you being too drunk to think properly? Did you even mean what you said?" Her voice was indignant.

"No, no, no! I truly, truly mean it- I'm an honest drunk. A very honest drunk. I just wanted to warn you before you came that I am not entirely up for going out dancing or anything like that."

She laughed, wickedly. "Not what I was planning, but okay."

"What were you planning?"

She just laughed again.

"Ashley? What are you planning?"

"Just make sure there's some whiskey in that bottle when I get there."

And she hung up.


End file.
